100 Word Soup - A Drabble Collection
by 231915
Summary: Prompt: #57 Blood. XANA couldn't kill humans short-term, so it did the opposite. [100 Word Drabbles from XL and elsewhere.]
1. -- Halloween

**A Halloween Drabble, however you want it.**

Just because you're a slave to the most misguided AI since 2001 doesn't mean you can't have a little fun.

* * *

"It's okay, right?" William cooed, throwing a white sheet over Manta and positioning the little eyeholes on its head just so. Manta stiffly bleated when William clambered onto its back, the sheet bunching up under his clearly labeled patellas. Williams sat back and drummed his fingertips—er, _distal phalanges_—on the very inaccurate representation of his respective femurs. He glanced down, brow furrowed.

"Man, where are they? I'm starving. Look, you can see my ribs."

.

"Now I've definitely got a bone to pick with them."

.

.

.

"Come on, Manta, don't you find my jokes... _humerus_?"

.

.

Manta hovered silently, contemplating its escape.


	2. 33 The Road Not Taken

**#33 The Road Not Taken**

What is that road? Not taken.

Time. Moves forward. Bit by bit. Line by line. Your failures. Forming a song. The mantas cry. The hornets cry. The boy cries. His friends cry. Your daughter cries. This was. All your fault. I.

Look back. And regret. I look forward. And I regret. This will happen again. You will lose her again. I will lose you.

Again. Your memory leaks. You can forget. Convince yourself. Humanity is not doomed. You overlooked a choice. There exists another road.

I remember.

There has always been only one road.

I cannot save us anymore.


	3. 43 Sick

**#43 Sick**

"XANA's what?!" 5aaammm. 5M. 5 AM. The clock's red numbers jumped with each beat of Jeremy's heart. His hand scuttled over his nightstand for his glasses.

"I can feel it," Aelita coughed over the phone. "My mouth hurts, and I can't breath through my nose, and everything itches."

Jeremy's hand paused. "This again? It's not XANA. You have a cold."

"What if you're wrong?"

"Okay, okay." Jeremy conceded, only to be met with silence. "Aelita?"

"I'm crazy, aren't I?"

"You're you. We'll check it out."

Jeremy thought about adding "for the last time", but he couldn't bring himself to do it.


	4. 47 Before and After

**#47 Before and After**

Under the stairs, Yumi sat cross-legged with a book in her lap, her phone illuminating the pages. She meant to work through the problems, but she was so tired of solving problems.

Buzz. She was tired of texting, talking, smiling, laughing. She was tired of ignoring, shrugging, frowning, yelling. She was tired of the eggshells that were Ulrich's and William's feelings. She was tired of Aelita's tears. She was tired of Odd's everything.

In the darkness, the corner of Yumi's mouth twitched. She wondered how to respond to this message from the only person she could count on to solve his own problems.


	5. 49 Symphony

**#49 Symphony**

"You are my vessel," said the glowing sphere. "Young princess, you will Sing."

Aelita trembled. All these years-reading holy codes, searching seas, excavating the core-had finally come to fruition. Creator chose one to Sing its Song of earth, of birth, of life. She had same power to create as Creator.

Creator's blessing signified the return of its eternal enemy, Xana. Xana had its own vessel and its own Song, but not of life.

Aelita now heard the faint, dark Notes striking the gilded cloister windows. Xana's chosen had already found her.

"It's time."

Her bodyguards flocked to her side, weapons drawn.


	6. 57 Blood

**Blood**

On impact, his hungry attacker's head exploded into a shower of black. It was the only way to be sure.

"Nice one, Daddy!"

His sword dissolved into a black mist, entering him once more through his pores, hissing into his self-healing wounds. 500 years ago, his black mist was just a line of code in a big machine that couldn't invade anybody.

He didn't know he had nanomachines in his blood, or that XANA's most devastating strike on humanity would come just five years after the birth of his daughter.

"Baby, come here." He studied the body as the little girl kicked the head far away. "It's your turn to dress this one."


End file.
